“I should hardly have thought,” answered the young man, coldly, “that you would have been in such a hurry.”
Mr. Bradfield thought it better for the moment to ignore this speech.
“But what is this?” exclaimed he, with apparent solicitude. “You have recovered your speech, your hearing! It is miraculous!”
“Not quite,” answered the visitor, in the same tone as before. “I hear, as I speak, with difficulty. But I am under treatment which, they tell me, would have cured me altogether, if it had been applied earlier. I was not dumb from my birth, as you, no doubt, know.”
“Richard,” said Mr. Bradfield, earnestly, “don’t take this tone with me. You would not, if you knew what I have suffered since it was first suggested to me, a few weeks ago, that you were not really insane, as I supposed.”
“But what reason,” asked the young man, his voice betraying excitement for the first time, “had you for thinking any such thing? Why, if you had got such an idea into your head, did you not consult some specialist on mental cases? Isn’t a man’s whole life, his whole happiness, worth a guinea fee?”
Now Mr. Bradfield, luckily for himself, had had time to prepare himself for these questions. He knew exactly what line to take in answering them.
“Of course,” said he, “you can’t really believe what you suggest, that it was meanness which prevented my doing so. When you hear all my reasons for thinking as I did, you will agree with me that I had some ground to go upon. In the meantime, it is more to the point to tell you what I have been doing since Miss Abercarne (for it was she) expressed to me her belief you were sane.”
The mention of the girl’s name had, of course, the desired effect of making the young man listen. It seemed to argue good faith on Mr. Bradfield’s part.